Duke Energy - Lighthouse Innovation Group

Design Thinking Strategist

Lighthouse, the innovation hub for Duke Energy, a Fortune 500 electric power and natural gas company, engaged with me to manage and balance the needs of three business units in the research and development of a new scheduling product/ tool. 

Their Transmission, Natural Gas and Customer Delivery business units  were all using different tools and overlays to their central data hub to manage, schedule and track crew work assignments across their regional footprint (e.g. digging holes and installing pole for power lines, connecting natural gas pipelines, etc).

This also meant three different ways of maintenance and upkeep. The business decided to create one solution for cost savings and long term maintenance but needed to be able to meet the similar, but unique, needs of the business units.

Slate Scheduler

Slate Crews

I was brought onboard to manage the product team and lead the design thinking approach for a new, single experience that would balance all the needs of three business units and improve their collective experiences with a human-centered approach, engaging users and stakeholders closely every step of the way. 

We started with discovery and launched MVP in early 2023 with 3.0 rolled out by EOY 2023 as well as a second experience for crew management.

The new Slate Scheduler and sister-tool, Slate Crews, allow all three business units to manage their work in real time, with user-centered design elements like, sort/filter, search, calendar views, easy navigation, saving capabilities, export, syncing with related apps (e.g.PTO schedules), drag and drop functionality, configurable settings and displays and more.

We were able to effectively identify and prioritize user needs, gain consensus and move the project forward to adoption. We used in person and virtual workshops, frequent communication with our SMEs and stakeholders and change management strategy to get us through to the finish line.

The new experience allows users to save time, communicate easier, schedule more efficiently and have better line of sight to potential issues before they begin. We were able to turn resistors into our biggest supporters by bringing them along for the journey and allowing the users voice to be the loudest in the room.

In addition to the work for Slate, I was also engaged with the Nuclear team and several other projects related to portfolio and project prioritization and value.

Key Artifacts

  • Their current state was clunky, dated, lacked real time updates and other significant pain points identified by the users.

  • I crafted several multi-day in-person and hybrid workshops to establish the roadmap, MVP and post-MVP requirements and features.

  • User personas crafted to define needs for crew management in sister-tool, Slate Crews.

  • User journey process map to understand the various applications, dependencies and touchpoints as well as to help us understand prioritization of work.

  • Another example of one of the three current states that lacked user-centered design principles.

  • Cross-business unit prioritization exercise for MVP, weighted by adoption timeframe (i.e. earlier adopters votes weighed more).

Client Reviews

  • Isra has played a valuable part of the planning and organization for our new Slate tool. She does many things to help our entire team of SMEs from multiple business units along with the developers all be successful including organizing the group, finding common ground in each business unit's processes while mediating the group's many thoughts and ideas all while keeping us all moving in a forward direction.

    Client Stakeholder

  • In two words: incredibly positive. Isra joined a product team alongside a new product owner. Together, both have re-directed the team in tremendous ways - ensuring all users stay aligned, informed and continuously involved in endless discoveries. Isra's design and strategy leadership may have single-handedly saved the product from silently failing

    Client Team Member

  • Isra is unafraid to challenge and push which has helped improve our team's output and helped foster shared understanding with our project's stakeholders. She has a very go-getter attitude an established a high level of trust quickly. If Isra offers to take something on, I can trust she will include me in her thinking process as necessary and the task is being done to a high standard. No stone left unturned!

    Client Leadership

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